Impress, set up as an alternative press regulator to the industry-backed Independent Press Standards Organisation, is to seek recognition under the controversial royal charter.
Impress intends to make a submission to the Press Recognition Panel later this year. If the fledgling panel finds that Impress meets the principles of independent and effective regulation set out in the royal charter, the regulator says it will be able to offer publishers protection against the risk of exemplary damages in complaints that make it to court.
The risk of such damages come into force in early November and come as a result of the Leveson inquiry into press malpractice.
The royal charter was bitterly contested by the press, with many of the largest newspapers instead backing Ipso. Only the Guardian, Independent and the Financial Times among the largest national newspapers have so far failed to join Ipso.
Despite the failure of any media organisation to agree to be regulated by Impress, its six-strong board has voted to forge ahead with the recognition process.
Sir Harold Evans, patron of Impress and former editor of the Times and Sunday Times, said: “I watched a series of scandals unfold in British journalism in recent years. Without a scrupulously independent system for effective monitoring and correction, we risk more abuses and another sharp decline in the public trust which is itself the foundation of a free press.”
The Press Recognition Panel is expected to launch a public consultation by the end of July that will establish the criteria for awarding recognition to a proposed regulator.
Under the terms of the charter, recognised members of a recognised regulator would be protected against the risk of judges awarding claimants’ costs in libel or privacy actions.
Ipso, which has the backing of the vast majority of the UK’s major newspaper and magazine publishers, has said it will not seek recognition under the royal charter.
“The regulatory structure set out in the [royal] charter may not be widely loved, but it is the only one on offer that can deliver public confidence,” said Walter Merrick, chair of Impress. “We will demonstrate that it can work.”
Some have questioned whether a proposed regulator can apply for recognition when it does not have any members.
Even in the event of recognition, there is the possibility that the royal charter, and the Crime and Courts Act upon which it is based, could be challenged in the European court of human rights because it specifically targets print news publishers – the royal charter does not cover the BBC or bloggers, for example.
